This invention relates to video production, in particular apparatus for the recording of video clips and the editing of video clips into sequences.
The introduction and widespread availability of camera phones, small digital stills & video cameras and web cams has placed the means of video production into the hands of many users who are unskilled in film making and video production. The first people on the scene at large events are no longer news crews but members of the public with their camera phones recording video. Concerts, holidays & live events are all being recorded by the spectators and participants. UGC (User Generated Content) is the name given to this explosion of content by the telecommunications companies.
A first problem is that the UGC does not conform to a structure suitable for video production or filmmaking. For example, an unskilled user will not plan the shooting of video clips to conform to a story. This is because there is no skilled filmmaker or director on hand to prompt them with instructions with reference to a storyboard.
A second problem is that editing of UCG into video sequences is difficult for both the unskilled user and the professional editor.
For editing by the unskilled user, the tools for media editing are available, but are relatively complicated to use. Therefore many unskilled users stick to just recording video clips and do not assemble them into complete sequences such as videos, movies or podcasts.
In relation to editing by a professional editor, professional filmmakers use clapperboards and digital slates to identify scenes and takes during editing, but these tools are not suitable for users generating their own content because of the cost and inconvenience as the extra equipment has to be purchased and carried around. Also in consumer devices with integrated sound and video recording the synchronization function of the clapperboard or digital slate is superfluous. Therefore, the professional editor dealing with UGC does not have the benefit of scene identification information.
Companies have been set up to take a customer's digital media and assemble it into video presentations, but because of the problems discussed above, the editor at the company has to guess how the clips and stills fit together, perhaps just based on the date stamping, and make up their own story. The end result is better than no editing at all, but is still just an edited archive, which has sequences of events that don't make sense to the customer, in part because of the lack of direction during filming and a lack of communication with the editor.
Young people generate much UGC and it would be useful to direct and capture UGC in schools as part of the learning process, but the problems identified above are an obstacle to this. Taking an elementary or primary school as an example:                Traditional video production and editing processes appear to be too complicated and technical and contain too many steps between concept and final screened production, to realistically be used by pupils and teachers on an unsupported and regular basis.        Teachers are very “time pressured” and they have very limited time to learn and practice new skills.        Elementary or primary schools have no onsite technician, and day-to-day technical back up is provided by interested teachers.        Focusing on producing traditional finished discrete “television style programmes” is not the only method of using video and possibly not the most effective use of UGC in this context.        Simply making resources available will not result in the production of UGC.        Solutions are not robust and self contained, interfaces are not simple and transparent and resources do not involve minimal or no set-up.        Elementary or primary teachers use digital stills cameras and photographic print outs a lot. But they use video cameras and UGC playback in the classroom/school very infrequently.        The main reason elementary or primary teachers do not use more technology in the classroom is lack of confidence.        The main concern of teachers using technology in the classroom is that “Technical problems arise which are distracting to the class”.        Teachers are very positive about the theoretical advantages of using UGC technology in the classroom.        